Few will ever give you this credit, but you are dead on, munch. This is *exactly* what this franchise is doing.

Thanks. My emails to the team the last few years have included this, plus a few other reasons (mostly mlb financial support of bills like PIPA and SOPA, which among other things would essentially give them the right to shut down sites like WSI) as my reasons for not financially contributing to the team anymore. One person isn't going to change it though.

In many ways, I feel bad for Brooks Boyer. He can adjust prices (a big win for die hards) and he can tinker with marketability ideas, but at the end of the day, we are 10 games into the season, and its hard to be excited about anything we have seen. I am not saying the season is a lost cause, I am saying they are not going to draw unless they (a) get more known, better, SUPERSTAR level players or (b) Decide they want to win 95 games a year.

Thanks. My emails to the team the last few years have included this, plus a few other reasons (mostly mlb financial support of bills like PIPA and SOPA, which among other things would essentially give them the right to shut down sites like WSI) as my reasons for not financially contributing to the team anymore. One person isn't going to change it though.

Indeed, and they have won a single playoff game since that year. It is clearly an outlier. The franchise never really gained momentum on the field after that season. It's sad. Now they lie in the middle, lacking any personality or direction.

People have pointed out that JR seems to enjoy the "safety" of having his team earn $20-30M of net profit each year. Why risk adding a ton of payroll or investing in a massive expansion of your minor leagues/scouting/international player development when it could implode and hurt your bottom line?
It's easy for JR to set aside his "fan emotions" as owner of the White Sox. The Sox are not his first true baseball love...the Brooklyn Dodgers were. Sure, he wants the Sox to win and be successful, but he won't stretch himself financially to get them to the promised land. To compare, Mike Illich was born and raised in Detroit and has been a lifelong Tigers fan. His love for his boyhood team (and his deep pockets) have caused him to make "irrational" spending decisions by paying huge salaries to the game's top stars (Cabrera, Verlander, Fielder, etc).
Put yourself in JR's shoes: What if you were a super-successful businessman who acquired a baseball team that you had very little emotional connection to (like the Rockies for example). Would you dip into your personal wealth just to make the Rockies great? No, you'd focus on turning a profit year in, year out, and your emotions as a sports fan certainly wouldn't interfere with your business decisions for the team.

What if you were a super-successful businessman who acquired a baseball team that you had very little emotional connection to (like the Rockies for example). Would you dip into your personal wealth just to make the Rockies great? No, you'd focus on turning a profit year in, year out, and your emotions as a sports fan certainly wouldn't interfere with your business decisions for the team.

Baseball is a business for everyone involved except the fans. Owners became owners because they became millionaires based on business decisions, not on fandom or loyalty to laundry.

The White Sox organization is hesitant to use the term "rebuild" because the after-shock of the White Flag Trade still remains after all these years. Otherwise I don't know if there is a philisophical dilemma within the organization. If money is being made, what dilemma can there be?

I do think the team realizes it can't go through what it did in the late '90's. They can't have interest that low and expect to survive. So the organization has to show it has some interest in winning. They realize the economy is still not good and people are not going to shell out money to see a team win 80-85 games and finish out of the playoffs - again. At least the parking cost is down.

Other than that, I obviously don't know what goes on behind closed doors. I still don't think this ownership understands fans and, by this time, I don't think they care to. But they may have what they think is a solid long-range plan, and they may feel it is working. It just doesn't appear to be working now. Before we know it, it will be 10 years since the World Series. And that will pose a problem for the team, one much more real that philosohical in nature.

The White Sox organization is hesitant to use the term "rebuild" because the after-shock of the White Flag Trade still remains after all these years. Otherwise I don't know if there is a philisophical dilemma within the organization. If money is being made, what dilemma can there be?

I do think the team realizes it can't go through what it did in the late '90's. They can't have interest that low and expect to survive. So the organization has to show it has some interest in winning. They realize the economy is still not good and people are not going to shell out money to see a team win 80-85 games and finish out of the playoffs - again. At least the parking cost is down.

Other than that, I obviously don't know what goes on behind closed doors. I still don't think this ownership understands fans and, by this time, I don't think they care to. But they may have what they think is a solid long-range plan, and they may feel it is working. It just doesn't appear to be working now. Before we know it, it will be 10 years since the World Series. And that will pose a problem for the team, one much more real that philosohical in nature.

I don't know how anyone could understand the fans. You want green seats, bingo, green seats. You want a contender, bingo, won a WS, last year they were in first place, no one came. You want cheaper tickets and parking, bingo, cheaper tickets and parking, yet Sox fans will always move the goalposts. How often are teams expected to win the WS? If they win one once every 10 years, they would be one of the more awesome franchises in the league. To think they don't care to understand the fans is not paying any attention to what they have done the past 10 years or so. It's just an impossible task.